The Last Man's Dead
by AliceShe
Summary: It's not Lestrade's division so Sherlock has a case again.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Hi, this is only the first part, there will be more.**

 **Reviews please, they are so helpful to help continue the story and...here's the big one... IMPROVE your writing! Which is my ultimate goal. I wrote this a while back, so don't be to judgemental, it's only the first chapter of hopefully many!**

What are you doing John?" Sherlock questioned his flat mate, who was sitting at the table on his computer.

"I'm typing up our latest case, why are you asking, normally you wouldn't even notice." John turned around to look at Sherlock, who was lying on the sofa in his dressing gown in his thinking position.

"What makes you think that John."

John sighed, and went back to typing.

"It's true I don't notice, I can't expect you to understand." He jumped up and started to pace.

There was a silence again, just the sound of fingers on the keyboard.

It was vaguely irritating.

"Shut up John." Sherlock snapped, rubbing his temples. John looked up at him, shook his head, and continued again. Sherlock began to get wound up, he was out of his mind with boredom.

"What the hell." John exclaimed, putting his hands up to his head.

"Spell check again John? If so there's a button you can press..."

"No Sherlock, this is not ok, just not good, at all. Look." John interrupted And pointed at his screen. The screen was black, in the middle was a pixelated skull holding an orange in one hand and a lemon In the other, the skull itself was wearing a Pirate hat, on the hat the words "I'm not a Pirate Any More." , it moved from side to side on the screen and its mouth opened and closed. It's eyes were blank sockets.

"Don't touch it John, it's a virus. Don't even click anything." Sherlock pulled his friend away from the computer.

"what do we do then Sherlock, all my new stories haven't been published yet," John shouted, obviously distraught, "I can't just LEAVE it." He pushed Sherlock aside. Sherlock frowned. "I know you don't care about the blog, but I do, ok."

"Calm down John, I'm sure it will be fine, if you don't touch it." Sherlock sat down, then stood up again. He had now switched off sympathy mode. His face cracked into a half smile.

"Why are smiling Sherlock?" John looked taken a back.

"Don't you see John." Sherlock clapped his hands together.

"No, I don't see, Sherlock, I don't see, I have other things on my mind." But then he realised what Sherlock was thinking.

"It's meant for me." Sherlock said, "I'm getting dressed."

And with that he walked meaningfully out of the room and slammed the door to his room shut.

John sighed deeply and tried to breath normally, he couldn't get over the fact that it was his computer that got the mysterious virus, and it was going to mess up everything, and Sherlock was pleased. Why was he always pleased when bad things were happening.

A few minutes later Sherlock emerged from his bedroom fully dressed, he was just tying his usual blue scarf around his neck.

"Where are you going?" John asked.

"I need help with the computer, it's turned off and it's not working." He turned the computer to face his friend. Sherlock looked a mix between cross and disappointed. " I told you not to touch it."

"I didn't touch it, it just stopped working, it went dead."

"Well leave it, are you coming." He headed to the door.

" You haven't told me where we're going." John grumbled. Sherlock looked at his friend and smirked again, and then, in the most dramatic way possible he answered.

"To church."


	2. Chapter 2

**Heres the** **second** **chapter**... **Enjoy**

Sherlock called for a taxi and they soon arrived at St Clements Church.

"Why are we going to Church Sherlock?" John asked, putting on an 'honest to god I have no clue' sort of face.

" Didn't you see the virus on the computer?" He replied simply.

"Yes." John said, slightly frustrated with Sherlocks remark, how could he of not seen the virus, that was DESTROYING his computer. He lowered his eyebrows.

"I got sent this from an unknown number." He showed John the text, it read 'Someone's going to hell St Clements Church.'

"And you're not contacting the police?" John asked. Sherlock looked at John. "That's just typical of you isn't it, you make out like you want to save people and then you go along to watch?" John was laughing in disbelief now.

"No John, I will contact the police later if I think something is going to happen, though I doubt Lestrade will get there on time." He smiled slightly, and looked down at the phone again. "You can't always trust unknown numbers John, it could be a Hoax. So we are just going to go to Church and see what happens, ok? Undercover. Now stop with these annoying questions, it makes you out to be even stupider, it only works when I ask the questions."

John huffed and didn't reply, because there honestly wasn't any point.

The church was a tall, old, almost foreign looking building, which Sherlock deduced had once belonged to the Danish. A few dribbles and drabbles of old people wobbled their way into the Church, there wasn't many people going, nobody under the age of 74, and Sherlock noticed most of them were ladies. The bells rung out a tune John found familiar. "I know that tune." John said half to himself.

"Good for you" Sherlock answered and walked confidently up to the Church doors, quickly followed by John.

As they entered they slipped in at the back just before the service started.

They were seated next to an old lady with curly white hair, her tired brown hand reached out and patted Sherlock on the shoulder. "What a lovely young man!" She smiled sweetly. "You remind me of my grandson. So young and handsome, I bet you get all the ladies." She winked. Sherlock smiled falsely and turned back towards John. Who laughed until Sherlock glared at him to tell him to shut up. It got quiet in the church when a man stood up and walked down to the front.

"Good morning, now today we have a reading from Julie she will be reading a passage from Matthew..."

On and on and on, Sherlock was so bored, that went to his mind palace to try and figure out something else that has been bothering him. He was only reawakened by John slapping him in the face.

"What?" He said in a whispered shout.

"They are talking about how someone has disappeared who came to this church." John replied. "I thought you might be interested.

"No." Sherlock said. "I'm not. She died, she's not missing."

"How do you know that? Actually I don't want to know." John said and turned back to listen, feeling he was being disrespectful or something.

"Now we all stand to sing the hymn 'Jesus is Lord' it's page 189 in your hymn books." Said the man in a monotone voice which made you want to sleep.

Everyone stood up, and John felt sorry for the old ladies having to stand up, it was bad for their health.

When everyone started singing, Sherlock stood there looking around, eyeing each person, row by row.

Then he felt a sharp jabbing pain in his left foot, It was the heel of the shoe of the lady next to him.

"You have to sing, it's rude not to, come along young man, I'm singing and I'm 94, see, what's your excuse now hmm?"

Sherlock sniffed, and to Johns surprise picked up the hymn book and started to sing, John would never know if he started singing to get the lady off his foot or if he really did want to, because when he started to sing, it was rather good. A strong baritone, which was nice compared to the wobbly voices of the elderly.

On the page the hymn lyrics were on, a scribbly handwritten note has jammed in, it read. 'Wrong Place Sherlock, Wrong place.'

John was amazed by Sherlock's singing and several of the old ladies turned to look at Sherlock and smiled.

After the service they all turned round to talk to him.

"Oh Mavis, did you hear that lovely young man singing, it was rather good, you should come to the choir! What's your name love?" Said one old women.

"How's heart problems?" He replied.

"Oh, better thank you, have we met before?"

"Sherlock Holmes." He said.

"Sherlock! Haven't you grown, last time I saw you, you were this high!" She made a hand gesture to suggest that Sherlock had been about half a foot tall, which he didn't think he had ever been.

"Yes, well it's lovely to see you Iris, bye now." He said, trying to wrap up the tedious conversation.

"Tell your mother I miss reading her books! And tell your brother I miss his clever conversation, it was ever so interesting when he was younger, what does he do nowadays?"

"You can guess," he said, and quickly got up.

"And who is this? Your boyfriend? Well he's lovely too! What's his name?"

"Oh, we're not together..." John said quickly, and smiled at the ladies, who all looked at each other.

"Now we have to go now, so, nice to meet you all, see you again perhaps, I'm a doctor, so I'll be around to help if you need anything, just give me a call." He handed one of them a tiny card.

"You have a card?" Sherlock asked as they walked away.

"You never know when it might come in handy." John replied.

Sherlock put his coat back on as they got back out into the wind, it had started to rain again, just a drizzle, but enough to get you wet.

" I can't stay in that place any longer." He grumbled.

"Sherlock that was bloody amazing." John said after they had walked a little further along the street. Sherlock looked at him. "I always thought you would be rubbish at singing."

"Well thank you John." Sherlock answered and he called for the next taxi. They sat down and Sherlock told the driver to return to Baker Street.

"So the text was a hoax then?" John asked.

"It would seem so." Sherlock said, his voice was slightly on the verge of becoming aggressive, he was disappointed, and was failing at hiding it. But then buzzing sound came from deep in his coat pocket.

Sherlock picked the phone up and held it to his ear.

"There's been a murder at St Clements Church." Came the voice from the other end of the phone. Which John instantly recognised as Lestrade.

"But, we were just there." Sherlock answered. And looked behind him.

"Yeh, well, there's two St Clements Church's, and this is the other one, now you better come quick, coz its a weird one, and it's not my division." Lestrades voice soon crackled out.


	3. Chapter 3

The phone went dead with a loud beep.

"What was that about?" John asked, knowing something had happened.

"Someone's been killed, finally, something is happening!" Sherlock looked at John, who shook his head.

"Not great?" He asked.

"Not especially no," John replied solemnly.

"Ah." Sherlock said, and leaned forward to tell the driver to go to St Clements Church, Eastcheap.

They arrived at the other St Clements Church a while later, and John followed Sherlock inside.

"I found this note inside the hymn book." Sherlock whispered to John as he took the piece of torn paper out of his coat pocket and showed it to John.

"You better give it to the police for fingerprints." John told his friend, trying to take the paper.

"I don't want the police to think this trail is for me, they might start to get the wrong ideas." Sherlock snatched the paper back and stuffed it back in his coat again.

"Hello freak, this ones for you." Donovan Said.

Sherlock stepped forward looked around the church. "Where's the body?" He asked.

"There isn't really one as such..." Lestrade said slowly and walked backwards a bit. "Follow me." He beckoned Sherlock and John into a small area at the front of the Church near the alter. "It's like a 'blood shadow'." John gasped and tried to look closer.

"We have taken a sample to the lab to see if we can find a match, it's defiantly real blood though. Any ideas?" Lestrade tried to sound positive. . " A Witness said they saw a man with black clothing, and light brown hair leaving the Church about 20 minutes ago, but they can't remember much more about him."

"Five so far." Sherlock replied, he had brought out a tiny magnifier and was walking around the blood. "No that rules that one out." Sherlock mumbled to himself.

"John, any ideas?"

John sighed and bend down, "Well I can't give a doctors point of view, seeming as there isn't..." He thought for a second. "A body." He coughed. "But um, I'd say it was very new blood, only just been cut." He went a bit pale and stood up again. "Yeh, that's about it."

"Well, you missed out most of the important things, but we won't worry about that." He looked at John and smiled out the corner of his mouth.

"The person was still alive when they were brought here, but by the time they left, they were dead, the murderer obviously thought it was clever to use the old way of sacrifices for effect, he's obviously doing it for attention, they came in from the front, the Church was already empty, meaning the service had just ended, no one was here but the vicar. The victim was someone who came to the service, how can we tell, it's the only obvious solution. The vicar asked to talk to him, then killed him. That's idea 1..."

Everyone was staring at Sherlock. Then Lestrade spoke. "I've just been sent the results of the blood sample, we have a match, Matt Abrams, fruit salesman, down at the local market. Got arrested once for pirating videos."

"Should we talk to people at the market?" John asked Sherlock,

"You can, I'm going back to Baker Street."


	4. Chapter 4

John left Sherlock outside the church and he walked off to the market. The market was a very colourful and loud place, buzzing with life and sound, the shouts of the competitive salesmen, the sound of money, and rustle of paper bags.

"Fresh oranges, sweet Lemons,"

"Want to get rid of Me? Buy my mangos!"

"Roll up, Bananas and pears,"

"Lovely Veg! Get your lovely veg!"

John made his way through the crowds towards 'Matt Abrams Fresh Produce Stand.' There was a grumpy looking young women standing at the stall, she wasn't making much of an effort to attract business.

"Hi, I'm John, John Watson,"

"So, am I meant care? Who cares who you are what do u want?"

"Oh, I don't want any fruit, thanks."

"So you are flirting?" She flicked her hair away from her face. "Coz, I'm taken sweetheart."

"No,no, I'm not... I'm with the police."

He looked slightly embarrassed at the misunderstanding.

"Oh right.. this is about Matt? Where is he, he hasn't come to work for two days, I miss him."

"Oh, is he your..." He moved his hands to try and get her to understand.

"Yeh, and he hasn't called me since Friday, where the hell is he?" She got out her phone and looked at his contact details.

"I'm so sorry, but he's missing." John didn't like having to be the one to break bad news, it was the bit he hated about being a doctor.

"What? Like kidnapped?" Her face went from grumpy to scared in an instant.

"We... I don't know." John said in his most doctorly caring voice.

"We have our best man on it, I'm sure we'll have so thing to go on soon."

The women wrapped her jacket around her and zipped it up. "He was always so kind to me." She whispered nostalgically, once she had recovered from the shock slightly. "I had a feeling, a gut instinct, that he'd ask to marry me, I could feel it." She sniffed and tears started to form in her eyes. She waved her hands in front of her eyes. "Oh don't mind me, getting all emotional. What am I like? Eh, I'm sure he's just got family problems, or something, he has family in Sweden, lovely people, used to be very rich, somehow lost all their money." She stopped and laughed nervously. "Why am I telling you all this?" She said apologetically.

"No, it's ok." John smiled sadly.

John walked away from the market and went to the street to get a taxi back to the flat. He felt awful for the women, and found it hard to leave her there after hearing the news, it wasn't his place to tell it anyway, the police could bring her in for questioning. His phone rang, it was Sherlock. "About time too." He said to himself.

He called for the taxi and directed it to Baker Street.

"Hello, Sherlock, what are you doing?"

"John have you found anything yet?"

"Yeh, Matt Abrams hasn't been at work for two days."

"As his girlfriend?"

"Well she's distraught obviously, but I thought she would be worse."

"Yes, why did he go to church but not work?"

"Could of been ill." John suggested helpfully.

"Yes, I suppose." He sighed.

"Anything else John, did she say anything else?" He sounded up tight, so John tried to remember everything she said.

"Um, Matt had family in Sweden, who fell into hard times, lost all their money."

The phone went dead.

"Sherlock?" He called. He had hung up.


	5. Chapter 5

John arrived at 221b Baker Street about 10 minutes later and ran upstairs to the sound of violin. Sherlock was sitting in his chair playing very loudly and triumphantly.

"Sherlock?" John was standing right by him now. "I am here you know?"

"I've done it John, I've told Lestrade, they found the body at the back of the church, some of his family hasn't bothered to come to London yet, they are still in Sweden."

John looked confused.

"Sorry, Did you say Sweden."

"Yes,Matt and his family sell thousands of illegally imported fruit from Sweden. One day the buyers stopped paying for the produce they received. His family stopped receiving money and soon got found out for illegal importation, this is how they fell on hard times, Matt fled to England and took all the money with him, he didn't care for his family, he only cared about himself. His family hate him."

"So, they came to England to get revenge?" John concluded.

"No, someone else did it for them. They didn't do it, they got contacted, and someone said they would do it for them."

"Right... So like an assassin?" John tried to imagine it.

"No, that's what I thought at first, but no. He did this for sport" Sherlock ended and then picked up his violin to start playing again.

"Is that it then?" John thought for a minute and then a thought struck him. "Wait, so that virus thing, on my computer, if that was meant for you, then is it from the murderer?"

"Yes. John, and I don't think this is over yet, do you?"

John looked up to the ceiling, and rubbed his hands down his face in despair.

"The game is never over John."

John was sitting on his chair reading the newspaper. It has been about a week since the last case, and Sherlock said he was just waiting for a call, and he had gone to his room.

John picked up his phone and checked his emails, his blog, and his messages. It was pretty clear today was going to be a boring day.

He was just about to put the phone down again when something popped up on the screen, it looked very similar to something he'd seen before. Disaster clouded his mind and he felt himself drifting away from reality and into a breakdown spiral he couldn't get out of. It was a similar message to the virus he had seen a few weeks back, that awful laughing skull, it was holding some old fashioned money. A message scrolled past on the screen:

'Arrrrgggh My Harties! Oh yeh, you're not a Pirate anymore, you're a serious detective, how fancy. Oh John, hello, we haven't met before, but we will! What fun that shall be'

"Uhh..Sherlock" John shouted, but he was a bit distracted by the thing on his phone.

"What?" Sherlock snapped and walked out of his room and over to where John was pointing.

"It's happened again, oh my god, it's happened again, I can't even..." John felt light headed.

"John, calm down."

"Yeh. You can say that, but why does it happen to me, he has your number, he should do it to you!"

Sherlock ignored him.

A message appeared on Sherlocks phone at this moment. 'Another ones almost dead. Does this ring a bell?'

"I thought he might of given up, but the game is on again John!"

John looked at Sherlock, he was not happy. The detective could at times, ok, all the time be very, insensitive, and sometimes John had had enough.

"Sherlock, it's not good, and it's not a game, your acting like a child." Sherlock looked at his only friend and did something he didn't normally do, apologised. "Sorry." He honestly did look a bit sorry. "You know me John, I don't know how you put up with me. It's amazing how you stimulate my genius with your average brain."

"Thanks Sherlock, your getting better at the whole apologising thing." John said sarcastically.

"I'm glad." He said. "Now we must find out what this message means."

Mrs Hudson came through the door at the exact moment.

"Boys, there's a man down there for you, he said its urgent, I hope I'm not interrupting anything." She gestured downstairs where they could hear someone cough and then walk around a bit.

"Let them up."

"Sorry Mrs Hudson, but we are actually a bit busy," John stated.

"Ignore him, bring him up Mrs Hudson."

Mrs Hudson sighed in a 'I'm not your housekeeper' sort of way and hurried downstairs to tell the man to come up.


	6. Chapter 6

**Heres the next part... Enjoy And review even if you only say one word. Thx**

He was a tired looking man, wearing a black hoodie and a Star Wars T-shirt and baggy blue jeans. He stood with a slump, his shoulders preceding straight up to his head, his neck seemed invisible. The hair that stuck out of his greasy head had been recently dyed black and stuck to his face and covered his right eye. He was suffering from a cold and kept snivelling uncomfortably.

"Hello." John said cheerily.

"I'm Martin Bell. I've come to, tell you something." He shuffled his feet a bit, his trousers dragged on the floor, he was wearing strange green coloured converses, covered in dirt, the laces had been replaced 3 times, one time with a piece of string.

"Yes, I know. Sit down." Sherlock pulled up a chair and the boy slouched down.

Then John and Sherlock sat down opposite. Mrs Hudson who was standing awkwardly at the door, scurried away.

"So, Martin. Go ahead, and make it a good one, this mystery murderer has been getting boring, please make it more stimulating by making this an adequate case." Sherlock leaned back in his chair.

"Well, it was yesterday. I was sitting in my usual place, by the bins."

"You're homeless?" John looked a bit pitiful.

"Of course he is, now get on with it." Sherlock snapped impatiently.

"Yeh, about 3 weeks now. I've heard all about you Mr Holmes through your homeless network, see, I knew I could come to you about it."

John could suddenly smell something awful coming from the boys direction, maybe they should offer him a shower later. The boy continued.

"So yesterday, I was getting a bit of cash, and then I saw it didn't I." He shrugged and shivered.

"What did you see." John enquired.

"There was this man, crazy, he was crazy. He had blonde hair and a scar on his ear, he attacked this other homeless man, said he owed him 5000 pounds or something, he said he'd been asking for ages and he'd given up asking, then he attacked him right there in front of me. I think he saw me staring, he might be after me Mr Holmes." He scratched behind his ear and coughed again.

"The homeless man that got beaten up asked me to give him money to borrow, I gave him a fiver, he never gave it back. He owes a lot of people."

"What did he look like?"

"His face was quite forgettable, I can't really remember what he looked like, he had black hair though."

"And Martin, had you seen the blonde man before?" John asked.

"No, when I asked Todd if he knew anyone with that description, he said he didn't."

"Yes, Todd would know." Sherlock said out loud.

"Do you think the blonde man could be our murderer." John enquired.

"Perhaps." Sherlock replied and frowned.

When they had got the boy to have a shower, John went to make some tea.

"Where's the milk Sherlock?" He asked as he opened the fridge to find a human brain covered with blue liquid.

"We ran out, I used it up." Sherlock said, he was now standing by the window looking out.

"Yeh, well I'll go get some more from the shop." John walked out the flat and met Mrs Hudson on the stairs. She seemed worried.

"I had a phone call from someone, said they were coming over, I didn't catch the name." She whispered.

"Well, ok, I'll be back in a minute. Thank you for telling me." He smiled and flung open the door and stepped outside.

A black car was stationary outside, it was waiting for him.

"Not really an appropriate moment, but never mind." John sighed and got in, he knew where he was heading.


End file.
